following a competition held by the central bank of norway, designs have been selected for the country’s new banknotes, with the backs featuring graphics by snøhetta and the fronts by the metric system. the
team and norges bank will be fine-tuning the schemes to incorporate
security elements and refine motifs. the new currency is intended for
initial issuance in 2017 at the earliest.

based on the theme of ‘the beauty of boundaries’, snøhetta
conceived a graphic language referential to norway’s landscapes, and in
particular their long coastline — ‘the transition between sea and land’.
the design for the backs of the banknotes is organized as
pixelated compositions, which dually represent digital and analog
imagery. in abstract ways, the mosaic-like motifs allude to dynamic
environmental forces such as wind and waves, while organizing themselves
about legible horizon lines.

these cubical patterns will be complemented by the metric studio’s proposal, ‘norwegian living space’.
the design utilizes typically nordic imagery, including a lighthouse,
fishing boat, historical viking vessel, and other depictions of sea
life.

for the notes’ fronts, snøhetta proposed a series of black and
white photographic images which portray the coutry’s coastline in
various ways. the gray-scale tones contrast the vibrant colors of the pixelated compositions, and also, ‘complement the norwegian style and tone’. through their open ended nature, the images allow for various readings and allow for a diverse range of interpretations.

‘our organic pattern abstracts the sea. seen in connection with the
rational cubical pattern, it emphasizes the differences between the soft
and the hard. both patterns follow the beaufort scale, as an expression
of wind force, affecting the waves of the sea. on the 50 NOK note the
wind is gentle, represented by short, cubical shapes and long, tame
waves in the organic pattern. on the 1000 NOK note the wind is strong,
expressed through sharp long shapes on the cubes and short waves.’

snøhetta introduces its proposal with the following basis:

‘human beings settle nearby rivers, mountain chains, mountain
passes, and coasts. we settle near boundaries – near the boundary
between one element and the other. the beauty of boundaries is about the
transition between sea and land, where something meaningful and
interesting happens. over time the sea becomes commonplace, just as land
easily becomes so. however, where sea and land meet there is life.
there is life in the same way as life on earth exists between sea and
air, between land and air. where water meets earth, soft meets hard, wet
meets dry, life is created.’